September 13, 2009

CHEMISTRY OF IONOSPHERE

Ionosphere is the conducting layer at an altitude of about 80 km and above. This zone of atmosphere was initially probed by radio-waves from ground and later by radio-sounders carried by rockets or direct measurements of gaseous components. Salient features of the chemistry of ionosphere are discussed below.

1. Ionosphere can be differentiated into various layers which represent zones of different electron densities. As a whole, ionosphere is electrically neutral since it also has positive ions like O2+, O+ and NO+. The positive ion chemistry is highly distinctive for various layers of ionosphere.

2. Ionosphere structure shows diurnal and long-term changes. Most important long-term changes correspond to solar sunspot cycle. Changes affect reflection of radio-waves and also alter the concentrations of various species in upper atmosphere.

3. Electrons in ionosphere are produced by photo-ionization. Above the altitude 100 km, this photo-ionization is brought about largely by extreme ultra-violet radiation. At lower altitudes, Lyman-A radiation is important. Some contribution to photo-ionization at somewhat lower altitudes is also made by cosmic rays. However, due to magnetic shielding of Earth, cosmic radiation is only important at fairly high latitudes. Night-time ionization is attributed to a downward flux of protons and radiation from excited species in the upper atmosphere (i.e. UV night glow).

4. In D region of ionosphere, electrons are produced principally by photo-ionization of nitrous oxide because it has lowest ionization potential among dominant species in the atmosphere. However, NO+ is not the most abundant positively charged species in the upper atmosphere. At altitude about 80 km, principal ion is a water cluster or hydrated proton i.e. H+(H2O)2. The charge initially carried by NO+ is transferred to water via an O2+ intermediate.

5. Production of electrons and ions is balanced by loss processes in a quasi-steady-state ionosphere. Loss processes usually involve reduction of photo-electron to thermal energies followed by ion-electron recombination or electron attachment. Typical processes are:

NO+ + e- ——> N + O (dissociative recombination)

O+ + e- ——–> O + hv (radiative recombination)

O2 + O2 + e- ——> O2- + O2 (three-body attachment)

6. In F-layer of ionosphere, positive charge is largely carried by O+ while at lower levels, it is more likely to be present on NO+, O2+ and lower down in atmosphere, on hydrated proton.

7. Though hundreds of reactions are used in descriptions, positive ion chemistry is still poorly understood. D-region of ionosphere is particularly complex because of the presence of an extensive array of negatively charged poly-molecular hydrates of water.

8. E-region of ionosphere is interesting because it sometimes shows thin sporadic layers that appear to be derived from metal-ion chemistry in mid-latitudes. Intensities of these layers show significant increases in response to meteor showers so it is possible that metal ions have extraterrestrial origin. Typical reactions are:

Mg + hv ——-> Mg+ + e-

Mg+ + O2 + M ——-> MgO2+ + M

Mg+ + O3 ——–> MgO+ + O2

The first reaction produces electrons but subsequently they react with charged metal and metal oxide species.

9. In the ionosphere, O+ ions are normally removed through reaction with oxygen and nitrogen:

O+ + O2 ——> O2+ + O

O+ + N2 ——> N2+ + O

But reactions involving hydrogen or water are about 1000 times faster. This leads to considerable reduction in concentration of electrons through following reactions:

O+ + H2O —–> H2O+ + O

O+ + H2 ——> OH+ + H

followed by:

e- + H2O+ —–> H2 + O

e- + H2O+ ——> OH + H

e- + OH+ ——-> O + H

10. Human activities can also affect the ionosphere chemistry. For example, at first launch of Skylab, a large booster operated in upper portion of ionosphere (at altitude 190 km). During the portion of flight through ionosphere, some 1.2 x 1031 molecules of water and hydrogen were released were released due to which electron densities were lowered over a radius of 1000 km around the flight path of the rocket thus creating an electron-hole.